Chapter 6 - WHAT THE CAMERA ACTUALLY SHOWED
Before confronting Harland, I called my own security chief.
“Marcus, disable Harland’s access to stored security records.”
“Immediately?”
“Yes. Don’t confront him. Preserve everything.”
Then I returned to the main house.
Marcus met me under the stone awning with a tablet.
“The laundry footage.”
At 1:31 p.m., Harland appeared in the service corridor with Nora.
The camera inside the hallway had audio.
His voice was calm.
Almost gentle.
“Your mother left Mr. Luca’s shirt unfinished.”
Nora said something too quiet to hear.
“Well, perhaps she’ll finish it tomorrow if she’s still working here.”
A pause.
“Mama works here.”
“For now.”
My hand tightened around the tablet.
Harland continued.
“People have to be useful, Nora. Your mother knows that.”
“She sick.”
“Yes. Which is why you should let her rest.”
Then he pointed toward the laundry room.
“The shirt is in there. Don’t touch anything.”
And walked away.
He hadn’t ordered her to scrub my shirt.
He had done something more calculated.
Placed fear beside a problem and allowed a three-year-old to connect them.
“Save this in three locations.”
“Already done.”
My phone rang.
Unknown number.
“Mr. Moretti?”
The voice was older than I remembered.
“Daniel?”
“I got your email.”
“Thank you for calling.”
“What do you want?”
“The truth about why you left.”
Daniel laughed once.
“Harland finally get caught?”
“That’s what I’m trying to determine.”
Daniel told me he had written to my office four times.
Three messages went back through Harland.
The fourth reached someone else.
Someone called him from a blocked number.
“They said they were speaking on your behalf.”
“What did they say?”
“That I should stop accusing estate management of fraud.”
“I never authorized that.”
“I figured that out.”
Then I asked about his rent.
“Five hundred fifty a month.”
“For six years?”
“Yes.”
“And when you started questioning it?”
“That wasn’t what scared Harland.”
“What was?”
Daniel became quiet.
“The emergency fund.”
I frowned.
“What emergency fund?”
“You really don’t know.”
It wasn’t a question.
“The one every staff member has been paying into for years.”
May you like
Then the call dropped.
And suddenly, fake rent looked like only the first layer.
